The present invention relates generally to the field of information privacy and confidentiality, and more particularly to protecting sensitive information collected during verbal communications.
Information privacy (i.e., data privacy or data protection) is the relationship between the collection and dissemination of data, technology, public expectation of privacy, and the legal and political issues that dictate what is considered to be private information. Privacy concerns arise whenever personally identifiable information or other sensitive information is collected, stored, used, or otherwise disseminated. Some contexts where information privacy may arise include healthcare information, criminal information, financial information, address information, internet usage, and location based services (e.g., geo-location applications).
Voice application devices are devices that record and/or otherwise communicate with the human voice. Voice application devices can be found in computer operating systems, commercial software for computing devices, mobile phones, and automobiles. Examples of voice application devices include voice command devices (VCD's), monitoring devices, and companion devices, such as humanoid robots. Voice application devices may be speaker dependent or speaker independent. The latter such devices can respond to multiple voices, regardless of an individual's speech prosody characteristics. Current voice application devices are not only capable of receiving voice commands, but are further capable of responding, providing feedback, or otherwise generally imitating a natural voice conversation.